South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley on Wednesday will promise the Senate she will defend Israel as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, including by refusing to abstain from future votes on anti-Israel resolutions.
The Obama administration was heavily criticized for abstaining on a resolution condemning Israeli settlements in disputed territory. But Haley, President-elect Trump’s pick to represent the U.S. at the U.N., said that wouldn’t happen again.
“I will not go to New York and abstain when the U.N. seeks to create an international environment that encourages boycotts of Israel,” she said in prepared remarks to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “In fact, I pledge to you this: I will never abstain when the United Nations takes any action that comes in direct conflict with the interests and values of the United States.”
Haley said Israel has been the U.N.’s biggest failure, in light of the several resolutions broad forward each year that condemn the country.
“In the General Assembly session just completed, the UN adopted twenty resolutions against Israel and only six targeting the rest of the world’s countries combined,” she said. “In the past ten years, the Human Rights Council has passed 62 resolutions condemning the reasonable actions Israel takes to defend its security.”
“Meanwhile the world’s worst human rights abusers in Syria, Iran, and North Korea received far fewer condemnations,” Haley added. “This cannot continue.”
Haley also indicated she would make sure the U.S. is getting its money’s worth from the U.N., given how much the U.S. contributes to the body.
“We contribute 22 percent of the U.N.’s budget, far more than any other country. We are a generous nation,” she said. “But we must ask ourselves what good is being accomplished by this disproportionate contribution. Are we getting what we pay for?”
“To your credit, the Congress has already begun to explore ways the United States can use its leverage to make the United Nations a better investment for the American people,” she said. “I applaud your efforts, and I look forward to working with you to bring seriously needed change to the U.N.”
